Remaking Our Economy

December 29, 2008

By Jean Eisenhower

I never thought I’d hear it on mainstream public radio: “The crashing economy can actually be a good thing. The existing one doesn’t represent our values. In creating a new economy, we have the chance to create one based on our collective values.” (Paraphrased from an interview on NPR’s “Fresh Air,” hosted by Terry Gross, November, 2008]
I’ve been waiting for this time for years. Economists the world over have been saying, for years, that we were living in an economic bubble of illusion which had to crash. And now it has.
Before we all panic, let’s think about what that means. Are we going to wait until the powers that be, which created this mess, come up with a plan? Or shall we remember that economies are all about trust… and whom do we most trust? Invisible, unreachable people in DC? Or - our neighbors, family members, best friends, friends of friends, club members, church members, parents of our children, children of our friends…? You get my point. So, let’s work with them.
Economy is all about give and take. What do you need? What do I need? What can we exchange with one another? And what all do we have in our community?
I’d rather buy locally-made furniture any day, rather than something trucked in from a shop somewhere where the workers are having far less fun than the peerson working in his or her garage. That way my money can support fun, creativity, uniqueness, love and satisfaction for one of those people on my list, maybe a neighbor.
We could support an entire cottage industry for people learning those skills, say, in a collaboration between furniture stores and independent woodworkers. We could repair and recycle old furniture, keep it out of the landfill, provide skills to people who need new ones, and provide our community with all the furniture it needs, and in high fashion. Not a grim Depression-era picture, but, arguably, an improvement over what we’ve had, generally, for quite some time in Western culture.
Another example: How many people love to bake? Let’s create more bakeries. How many love to make tortillas? Why in the world ship them from wherever they do? Let’s make them here! An ideal community, I’ve always thought, would have a bakery and a tortillaria on every block.
How many love to garden? Let’s get at it. And let’s teach one another all we know, and grow food on every bit of spare land. It could be fun, beautiful, and create new bonds between people.
How many carpenters would like to help people make their homes more energy-efficient? We could design custom improvements for a series of homes in a teaching environment, to kick-start a community-wide effort to make every single home as energy-efficient as possible, with passive solar designs that can make some of the homes entirely energy-free (free from outside/pay-for energy), which one day might be a goal for every home. There’s nothing stopping us.
Who likes to brew beer? I’d love to drink local beer.
Speaking of drinking, some folks are worried (I recently heard a public service announcement to this effect) that our economic collapse could trigger depression, anger, excess drinking and domestic violence, not an uncommon pattern. But I’d like to suggest it’s most common when people feel trapped and frustrated; so if people were doing work they love, in our new, freely-created economy, a lot fewer people would collapse like that.
Who likes to sew? Let’s give ourselves wardrobes of custom-made items, artwork for the body! And recycle those that lost their design appeal, or more likely were never designed well in the first place…. Right?! Don’t we have “issues” with our clothing? Never sufficient pockets, or too binding, wrong fabric, whatever. How ‘bout a huge, local clothing and recycling/refabricating industry? I know that I have lots of good items I don’t wear that still have plenty of value, if only in the fabric. If some of my clothes could be remade to be truly functional, I’d need fewer of them. And all the excess could be moved into the community, to make sure everyone had what they needed. And everyday, some seamstress/tailor/fabric artist could spend their workday creating something entirely unique, maybe for a custom request, or maybe as an art piece, which some unknown person will fall in love with. That’s what we need: more art, more falling in love with the simple things of life.
We could all be doing the work of our dreams. We only have to do it. It needs no one to oversee it. No bureaucracy. No nothing. We only have to change our minds, and continue changing our minds, making adjustments along the way, refining, expanding, stepping beyond, becoming the artists of our world.
“…The chance to re-create the economy according to our own values.” Quite the moment in history into which we’ve been born, eh?

Jean Eisenhower is a local author, fabric artist, solar designer, and devotee of corn tortillas hot off the stove.

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